[virii] prayer

Pride has become cancerous in this heart, turning patches into flint; contracting in arrogance, they strike against each other in anger; how one impetuous flash, burns down a garden. Ya Rabb! erode away the malignant stone with the constant stream of Your remembrance.

قَالاَ رَبَّنَا ظَلَمْنَا أَنفُسَنَا وَإِن لَّمْ تَغْفِرْ لَنَا وَتَرْحَمْنَا لَنَكُونَنَّ مِنَ الْخَاسِرِينَ

They said : Our Lord! We have wronged ourselves. If Thou forgive us not and have not mercy on us, surely we are of the lost! [Al-A'raf (The Heights), verse 23]

[pathopoetry] the paper

I heard you wrote for the paper
so I thumbed through the pages, searching for you

- you were bold, and seized me by the hand.
For a moment my eyes were stopped in recognition
...then they resolved themselves, were glad for the encounter
pleased at the chance for conversation
even though the voice in my head
wasn't completely yours

Since when did you articulate like this?
When did you become succinct
how your thoughts would effuse

So you can be straightforward when you want to be.
You can be pithy; a tepid read.
It's well that more can now recognize your worth
though you had to blunt the angles of your words
those starbursts that had dazed me with their hues

but even this semblance of yourself
was worth seeing, after such a parting.
Perhaps it's better, so that in closing this, I know
I am not closing you

how could you fit
between the margins

[pathopoetry] Paper birch

My friend leaves me in the wind
And with the wind I sigh

And open the hand holding leaves of love

My sister far, when her sun will rise
the sun sets in my eye

I open the hand with the seeds of love

Wind, my leaves at the feet moving on
Cause them to pause and to understand
Seed, my paper birch above the clouds
Shading my dear under every sun
while the leaves receive her hand

and never let our boundaries move
places our sentiments lie.



-----------

[pathopoetry] I miss my sis-

I miss
my sis-
-ter, we
are far
she is
my star
my sun-
-flower
with words
exchanged
we part-
-ially
relieve
the strain
on both
our hearts
until
those days
she's near
those days
I try
to slow
the pen-
-dulum

Mind of a bemused essaist (and blunderous typist)

Engrossed in a reference book whilst preparing an essay on 11th century Andalusian poetry, I suddenly came accross a poem useful to quote and, instantaneously animated, kept my eyes locked to the page in fixed contemplation as my fingers rapidly and mechanically typed out the opening lines:

A full moon – a midday sun – a stem on a dune of sand – fragrant musk


But, looking up up at the document, I realized that instead of a delicate description of the beloved, I had unfortunately reduced her to:

A full moon – a midday sun – a stem on a dune of sand – fragrant muck